It is or is it not true that Hamlet was faking his insanity? I’m not saying Hamlet was faking the whole thing. The meaning for insanity on Dictionary.com is “a permanent disorder of the mind.” I don't think Hamlet had a permanent disorder of the mind he knew what he was doing and even planned the majority of the events that happened. Most of the time anyway.
Having your father die is bad enough, but to have your mother marry your uncle, within a few weeks of your father’s death? Then to see the ghost of your dead father. That would drive anyone a little insane, but maybe not to the extent that everyone thought Hamlet was acting. Hamlet is torn between acting sane and letting everyone else see him as insane.
Hamlet is so grieved by his father's death that he begins to think of suicide. “O,tht this too too soid flesh would melt thaw and resolve itelf into a dew!” (Act 1, Scene 2, Lines 129-130). Hamlet's next thought to be mad when he begins to follow the ghost. Horatio attempts to tell Hamlet not to follow the ghost, Horatio questions him to about what might happen if the ghost “assume some other horrible form Which might deprive your sovereignth of reason. And draw you into madness”(Act 1, Scene 4, Lines 72-74)?
Throughout the play Hamlet seems to act insane then sane again. His comment to his friends best describes his madness when he says, “I am but mad north-north-west: when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from handsaw” (Act 2, Scene 2, Lines 378-379). Hamlet is insane only when he thinks it is best for him to be insane. He uses his insanity as a way to vent his feelings toward others in the play.
Hamlet’s display of insanity allows him to prove that Claudius did in face murder his father. After seein...
... middle of paper ...
...s 319-326). Hamlet leaves his final words to Horatio. He tells him that he leaves behind a story unknown, and that he would like him to give up his happiness until the pain is gone and the story is told.
In summary, I do not think that hamlet was insane. I think he had every right to be mad and upset at everyone who done him wrong. He should not have held all of his feelings inside. If I had been Hamlet, I had been mad and wanted to avenge my father's death also. If he had been insane he would not have done all the things that he'd managed to do. It was a pretty smart plan that Hamlet had created, and it almost work, if everyone didn't die at the end.
Works Cited
Shakespeare, William. “The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark” Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing. Ed. Edgar V. Roberts. 9th Ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2009. Print
The question of Hamlet’s insanity is a question raised by many people, is Hamlet a great actor, or has he lost complete sense of what’s real? There is no right answer, there is no wrong answer, many readers have different perceptions on what really was going through Hamlet’s head. My perception is that hamlet comes full circle with his insanity, and at points lets it get the best of him, and brings him down to a extremely low point.
Is Hamlet sane or insane that is the question. There are many sections in the play which show portray him as being insane but there are such as the when he hears of his fathers death. On the other hand Shakespeare illustrates Hamlet as a sane person when ever he is with a non guilty party. Hamlet is clearly sane though because he acknowledges that he is putting on an act whenever he is acting crazy.
In Shakespeare’s play Hamlet the main character Hamlet experiences many different and puzzling emotions. He toys with the idea of killing himself and then plays with the idea of murdering others. Many people ask themselves who or what is this man and what is going on inside his head. The most common question asked about him is whether or not he is sane or insane. Although the door seems to swing both ways many see him as a sane person with one thought on his mind, and that is revenge. The first point of his sanity is while speaking with Horatio in the beginning of the play, secondly is the fact of his wittiness with the other characters and finally, his soliloquy.
There is a great controversy amongst those who have read and studied Hamlet by Shakespeare. People argue whether or not Hamlet had gone mad or not. Many people believe that Hamlet had actually lost his mind, while others believe that it was all just an act. Since Hamlet is the most widely published book in the world, besides the Bible, this question has been asked and analyzed many times to little avail. The answer is open to whatever one wants to believe, which may intrigue some and bother others. Throughout the play, Hamlet’s personality changed after certain events. The play starts with him very upset over his father’s death. Then, after he saw his father’s ghost, he became full of vengeance. He seemed to have completely
Is Hamlet truly insane? While the play is not extremely clear on the matter and often contradicts itself, many of Hamlet’s wild ramblings and words of nonsense seem to be not the true words of a madman. Hamlet says himself that he is merely “putting on an antic disposition” (Act 1, Scene 5, Line 181). He admits very early on in the play that his insanity will be nothing more than a ruse to fool those around him. This is further proven by the fact that when he is around Horatio he shows no signs of mental illness. He speaks calmly and everything he says makes sense.
Throughout Shakespeare?s play, Hamlet, the main character, young Hamlet, is faced with the responsibility of attaining vengeance for his father?s murder. He decides to feign madness as part of his plan to gain the opportunity to kill Claudius. As the play progresses, his depiction of a madman becomes increasingly believable, and the characters around him react accordingly. However, through his inner thoughts and the apparent reasons for his actions, it is clear that he is not really mad and is simply an actor simulating insanity in order to fulfill his duty to his father.
In Hamlet, he seems to be mad, but there is a question that everyone asks when reading or watching this play “was it, or was it not true that Hamlet was faking his insanity, really suffering, or maybe even both.” First, this is what insanity is: insanity is acting crazy, but not knowing that they’re acting crazy. Also, it’s going through a lot of stress at the same time causing you to act stranger then a normal person. Hamlet was not totally insane. It doesn’t fit.
Shakespeare, William. The Tradegy of Hamlet Prince of Denmark. New York: Washington Square Press, 1992
According to the article “9 Signs You Might Be Going Insane” by Mamapedia, Hamlet falls into several categories of mental illness ( Mamapedia). One of the mental ilness's that show Hamlet is insane schizophrenia. Hamlet can be considered to be schizophrenic due to his paranoia that everyone is on claudious's side and his his hallucination of his father's ghost in his mother's chambers as well as his delusion for revenge of his father's murder. In act 3, scene 4 Hamlet talks to his father's ghost in front of his mother but the ghost is completely imaginary to his mother Gertrude and she even calls him mad because hamlet seem to be talking to some kind of a hallucination (3, 4, 105-7).Therefore, this supports the argument that Hamlet is actually insane in Shakespeare's play Hamlet.
Throughout the Shakespearian play, Hamlet, the main character is given the overwhelming responsibility of avenging his father’s "foul and most unnatural murder" (I.iv.36). Such a burden can slowly drive a man off the deep end psychologically. Because of this, Hamlet’s disposition is extremely inconsistent and erratic throughout the play. At times he shows signs of uncontrollable insanity. Whenever he interacts with the characters he is wild, crazy, and plays a fool. At other times, he exemplifies intelligence and method in his madness. In instances when he is alone or with Horatio, he is civilized and sane. Hamlet goes through different stages of insanity throughout the story, but his neurotic and skeptical personality amplifies his persona of seeming insane to the other characters. Hamlet comes up with the idea to fake madness in the beginning of the play in order to confuse his enemies. However, for Hamlet to fulfill his duty of getting revenge, he must be totally sane. Hamlet’s intellectual brilliance make it seem too impossible for him to actually be mad, for to be insane means that one is irrational and without any sense. When one is irrational, one is not governed by or according to reason. So, Hamlet is only acting mad in order to plan his revenge on Claudius.
Hamlet throughout the play seems insane but in reality it is only an act to achieve his goal of killing his father's murderer. Hamlet chooses to go mad so he has an advantage over his opponent and since he is the Prince of Denmark certain behavior is unacceptable, so by faking madness he is able to get away with inappropriate sayings and actions. We can see this when he talks to Claudius, Polonius, Ophelia and his mother. When Hamlet talks to Horatio in the first act he says how he is going to "feign madness" and that:
Furthermore, while Hamlet attempts to avenge his father’s death internally, he must deal with the forthcoming exter...
...the rest of the play. The play ends with Hamlet’s death and possibly the clearest thought we’ve seen from him since the beginning of the play. Hamlet instructs Horatio to tell his story and to crown the invading Fortinbras king of Denmark. Hamlet is ready to take his final bow.
He appears to vary in how mad he is, sometimes appearing completely sane, and sometimes more insane. His madness is mostly portrayed through his ramblings at the other characters, or through soliloquies. Originally Hamlet was only feining madness in order to reach his goals and discover if Claudius was really the one who killed father. He decides this after meeting the ghost of his dead father: “As I perchance hereafter shall think meet To put an antic disposition on-...”(Hamlet: 1.5.171-172).The other characters pick up on his “madness” as the play progresses further. They were all curious as to the cause of Hamlet’s madness. Polonius and Claudius believe it may be caused by the lack of contact with Ophelia that they had caused, whereas Gertrude’s first thought was that it was to do with his father’s death. Hamlet keeps up his act throughout the whole play, calling Polonius a fishmonger at one point, and also when he berated his ex-girlfriend Ophelia, even stating that she should go to a nunnery. She comments on Hamlet after his rant: “Oh what noble mind is overthrown…”(Ophelia 3.1.144). She starts to believe he has really gone mad, and that he truly does not care about her anymore. This also becomes a problem for the kingdom, as Hamlet is a royal and the heir to the throne, so having madness could be potentially calamitous for all of them. Shortly after
In the play Hamlet by William Shakespeare, the main character, Hamlet, is often perceived by the other characters in the play as being mentally unbalanced because he acts in ways that drive them to think he is mad. Hamlet may very well be psychotic; however, there are times when he “feigns insanity” in order to unearth the truth surrounding his father's death. This plan seems to be going well until Hamlet's mental state slowly begins to deteriorate. What began as an act of insanity or antic disposition transitions from an act to a tragic reality. After studying Hamlet's actions, one will notice that as the play progresses, his feigned insanity becomes less and less intentional and devolves into true mental illness.